Our Fortnightly Update on Position of the Vulcan Forged Ecosystem
1. Finish current games
Game Council Summary
The game council has discussed monetization and offered feedback on this. These include rare season rewards for users who reach the top tier in a competition, the VulcanVerse ‘workshop’ principle and building an avatar story through professions and skills — introducing microtransactions. The council acknowledge that careful planning is required to ensure balance here.
Discussions took place related to Cedalions and the possibility of Vulcanite and land pools, to ensure fairness and greater acknowledgement and interaction with guilds.
A further subject of discussion for the game council was building assets and their value — both monetary and as in-game objects, particularly looking at the definition between free building assets that come with leveling up and NFT building assets.
- Berserk
V3.1.1 was released Tue 22nd for testing, having been delayed from the week before due to Azure access issues (was initially due for release Thur 17th). QA identified an intermittent critical error that meant we couldn’t go to production with this build. The development team have been working on resolving that error, alongside a few QoL features. A new version was due Thursday 1st Dec, but was again pushed back due to not being quite functional. We should be getting that into QA today.
This new build should resolve the critical connection issue, as well as other minor bugs identified by community and testers, and re-introduce ‘fat finger protection’ to prevent miscasting of spells with no valid targets.
Starting next week will be the final phase of pre-season releases. Aiming for a production release on Tuesday, and a new PTR build by Thursday re-introducing the cosmetics features, and implementing a performance improvement for weaker devices.
Work will then begin on integrating rental systems and all missing Vulcanite heroes. This work will stretch over the holiday period and conclude in January, alongside any bug fixes for issues identified over Christmas, marking the final build ready for Season 3.
The My Forge team are making progress on the new leaderboard page, as well as booster pack opening flows.
Status of Prereqs to launch season 3:
V3.x.x stable and approved — ⏳V3.1.1 is in QA now.
Card draw balance change — ✅Accidentally stumbled upon a slightly better system. Looks even more positive so far. Will still go live with the next version to make it to production.
MMR Balance change — ⏳Options have been presented to devs for tweaks to the system. Due to complete by 09/01.
Remove Starter League — ⏳With the new cards and reworked card draw we feel Starter League is no longer necessary. We want to slowly work towards pulling the player base back together, but will continue to monitor the situation and make a decision closer to the season start.
Vulcanite rental, Card rental, addition of missing Vulcanites as heroes — ⏳due to complete by 09/01.
Approve new Prize structure -✅
Also, read our recent article on Berserk Season 3.
2. Vulcan Runner
a) iOS build updated and made live for the community
b) Android build updated and made live for the community
c) An updated version 9.0 was added to the PC launcher w/c 28th November. A detailed doc from the GOTM event has been sent to the dev team who are currently reviewing.
3. Tartarus
a) The implementation on the shared game design document is complete
b) The team is currently testing the game and fixing the bugs
c) A new build has been released to the test group and the philosophers for testing. Currently awaiting feedback from this before releasing to the community.
4. Tower Defense
a) The alpha version of the game based on the initial UI planned has been completed
b) The team has not been working on the game for last 2 weeks
c) A new build has been released on the playstore on 30th November. A detailed doc from the GOTM event has been sent to the dev team who are currently reviewing. The team are also preparing to start work on an iOS version of the game.
Marketing Update
We have identified key opportunities and are excited to announce we have done substantial progress at an organizational level to grow faster and better. At a marketing level, we have locked key partnerships to step up our effort to grow, engage, and retain players.
2. Announce C-Level hires
This task is personally managed by Jamie and a team of experts.
David Daumas, our new CMO is working alongside Chris Bowden who was announced as our CCO last week.
Marketing Update
Chris Bowden has joined Vulcan Forged as our Chief Communication Officer. He is bringing a wealth of experience strategically and tactically and is currently working on a social and community strategy.
3. Redefine our play-to-earn economy
This task is personally managed by Jamie and a team of experts. The Game Council and management are also developing this.
We can however tell you the following changes will be made:
$LAVA will become a static supply on Elysium only. More than 500m and less than 5bl. We know the number but won’t reveal it yet.
$LAVA will only be available after a gateway through $PYR. Examples including purchasing the Frenzy Pass (or gifting it to a Cedalion), holding a Forge Tier of $PYR to generate it or buying a $LAVA gem.
$LAVA will be deflationary, meaning on each transaction it will be burned and pegged to USD for transactions.
Frenzy games will still need a $LAVA entry fee, of which half will still be burned.
For $PYR to be the cow that produces valuable milk and for $LAVA to be at a sustainable value (thus increasing incentive for playing and holding $PYR) we believe a deflationary static supply is necessary.
Marketing Update
Similar to our last update, we first need to set ourselves up for success. We will then be working on the economy.
4. MetaScapes
Work in progress:
- Cinematic film & trailers.
- Ongoing marketing & development.
- New concept work + images.
- Alpha commenced & concept/description/gameplay are being documented (work in progress)
- Concept design for the four maps (based on the four environments — work in progress)
- CGI assets for the game (work in progress)
- Character creation (work in progress)
15th November 1st video teaser, now released:
15th December 2nd video teaser
25th January Final video release
Above are ETAs and are subject to change
Development & Gameplay:
In Progress by a dedicated Vulcan Forged & Metascapes development team.
Marketing Update
We are seeing more and more progress on the Metascapes front. We can’t say much more than go watch our trailers for now.
5. Mobile gaming focus
Cold Lava Implementation in mobile games is under discussion.
Dealing with iOS’s recent change in NFT mobile gaming rules.
Marketing Update
We have started strategic conversations with key businesses to inform our strategy for mobile gaming. Follow-up meetings will come shortly so you can expect a more tangible update in the next comms.
6. Migration to Elysium
Blockchain
- Certik Audit is nearly complete.
Most issues in the preliminary report have been resolved. Certik will evaluate all the acknowledgements and let us know the result. - Mapped PYR and wrapped LAVA both need to have the Lossless protocol included in their contracts. Vaival are working with Lossless on this.
- Aegis infrastructure from Lossless now has support for Elysium network so we can add any smart contracts we wish to monitor.
Elysium Website
- Complete. https://web-elysium.vulcanforged.com/
My Forge / Marketplace
- Ongoing community testing of Elysium testnet with Metamask hasn’t revealed any issues.
- Switch to Elysium can start when Audit and Bridge integrations are finalized and the Elysium Vulcan Forged NFTs are complete with minting and ready to replace users Vechain NFTs.
ElysiumScan
- Done.
Mainnet: https://elysiumscan.vulcanforged.com/
Testnet: https://elysium-explorer.vulcanforged.com/
Bridge
- Aegis integration of Elysium completed. Vaival have the API docs needed to integrate the security measures of Aegis into the bridge infrastructure.
NFTs
- Elysium mints continue by Night Angel.
- The API to be used by dApps for the Elysium NFTs is done. Was migrated to AWS and shifted to dynamoDB to improve performance.
Mainnet: : https://elysiumnft.vulcanforged.com/
Testnet: https://elysium-nft-api.vulcanforged.com/
Additional Services Provided by Nonceblox
- Cloud Wallet, Game SDK, JS SDK, SDK Docs, API Services, and Dev Portal have been finalized by Nonceblox.
- Cloud Wallet was completed, and Vaival have provided a design document for review.
https://xd.adobe.com/view/f2addac9-7ca5-4981-945c-dfc887a0c506-a7fe/
This will be a one stop portal to view Elysium related content and dashboard after connecting your wallet.
Game SDK still needs to be verified by the Game team.
Marketing Update
Marketing will be working on our brand strategy and key messaging in our next cycle.
7. UX, user retention and marketing
Marketing Update
UX, User Retention and Marketing. As per point 1, we can confirm a key partnership has been signed. In the next cycle, we will actively be working on implementation.
8. ElysiumSwap and Launchpad
ElysiumSwap
- Testnet complete. Waiting for token deployments on mainnet.
- Design work to improve mobile access was actioned.
Elysium Launchpad
- QA is ongoing, and cleaning up some front-end bugs
- Tiers for the staking requirements have been set after discussion with Jason, and will be pegged to set dollar amounts. Work has started to ensure launching a project involves a snapshot of pyr $ value to determine the tiers of participants.
- Mock IGO is being planned to run through the entire flow to ensure all standards are met.
Marketing Update
ElysiumSwap and Launchpad. Our new CMO hasn’t really been across this yet.
9. VulcanVerse Gameplay
A new medium article created to explain the ongoing work in the background to improve the underlying architecture of VulcanVerse in order to be able to have smoother release schedules, improved performance and ability to scale and incorporate new features.
This is something that has been ongoing in the background whilst the core game is being improved, the first phase of new features and legacy bugs and performance issues have been squashed by our development team along with the help of our stellar community testers.
Current Status:
1. LAVA Bank -LIVE.
2. Treasure Chest Stage 1 — ALPHA NOW LIVE.
3. Treasure Chest NFT — CARD READY.
4. NFT backend flow -READY.
5. Achievement System — ALPHA NOW LIVE.
6. Fishing Stage 1: ALPHA NOW LIVE.
7. Concept art for Landmark changes — Fortress of the Wind, Necropolis, Charos (Statue for the Necropolis of Hades)
All of the below to follow as per our pipeline
8. New Foraging System (complete revamp) — overview of foraging rework document has been released to various groups to gather feedback.
-Randomized loot tables
-Loot tables specific to quadrant and location
-Limited foraging crystals
-Limited amount of actively foraging Vulcanites per plot
-PVP Vulcanite battles during foraging
-PVE NPC boss/creature defending rich plots
-New spying system
-New Resource Sinks
-Pre-patch events
-In-game voting system using resources (materials, ex., wood, iron, etc.)
9. Lava Vulcanite unlocking system (possibly implemented before new foraging System)
10. Summoning process
-Vulcanites, fragments, scrolls, etc.
11. Alchemy system
12. Masteries
(*) At the same time as these will be released, some features are being reworked to become part of a bigger system where all features are interconnected.
(**) Major upcoming gameplay improvements on new foraging system to follow.
The team constantly monitors VulcanVerse player feedback. A full VulcanVerse update will be published shortly.
Troy
Expanded draft of Troy GDD ready
Feature & gameplay Troy GDD under review. The date for sale is not defined. The Game Council have provided feedback based on the expanded draft Troy GDD.
Pending below:
-Date for Sale
-Phases of Sale
-OG Badge early entry
-Troy Seed holders whitelist
-Public access
-Creation of a landing page
-Minting plots
-Marketing plan / strategy
– Plot information (work in progress)
-Tier information, including landmarks (description & design)
-Gameplay elements
-Landmarks being designed
Marketing Update
Marketing doesn’t have a major update on this.
10. US expansion
This task is personally managed by Jamie and a team of experts from the US.
Marketing Update
Jamie is all over this and marketing will be taken across this opportunity soon.